


Breeding Pens (cont.)

by Fic_finisher (orphan_account)



Series: Age of Apocalypse : Slavery Arc (Orig. AU) [1]
Category: Age of Apocalypse (Comics), Marvel (Comics)
Genre: Aftercare, Blow Jobs, Breeding, Canon-Typical Violence, Conditions similar to Holocaust, Cruelty, Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, Medical Experimentation, Medical Malpractice, Medical Torture, Mild Gore, More tags to be added, Multi, Objectification, Pedophilia, Sexual Abuse, Swearing, Teacher-Student Relationship, Victim Blaming, between the girls
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-23
Updated: 2015-08-23
Packaged: 2018-04-16 18:29:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4635744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Fic_finisher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Pens were a source of pain, the highest example of human - and mutant - suffering and humiliation known to either race. </p><p>The continuation of this [archiveofourown.org/works/2783402/chapters/6243890] unfinished AU fic about the comic-Age of Apocalypse Breeding Pens.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Faya

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Breeding Pens](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2783402) by [justwriting (orphan_account)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/justwriting). 



> Please remember the context of these drabbles: Age of Apocalypse was a harsh wartime setting with plots that focused strongly on discriminatory themes. These drabbles *WILL* contain racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia and any handful of other discriminating behaviors. It *WILL* contain heavy violence, because the characters are individuals who live in a society where anything and everything detrimental is acceptable and encouraged, as long as it's done by a mutant to a human. They are also canonically portrayed as brutal and harsh.
> 
> I, as the author, do not condone any of these behaviors, nor am I expressing hatred against any race, religion, sex/gender/orientation, or disability via these drabbles.
> 
> Chapters 1 and 2 contain semi-graphic non-sensual rape. Viewer discretion is advised.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The warnings for this chapter are: implied extremely underage sex/pedophilia, non-con, mild gore (non-graphic intestinal tearing), implied dehumanization, animal abuse.
> 
> But in comparison to the rest of the chapters, this one is actually relatively happy, fluffy, and lacking violence. What a relieving starter.
> 
> *now edited and expanded*
> 
> Okay it's not happy anymore.

Clarice awoke to a warm cloth on her forehead. She didn't move at first, not even a little, not to open her eyes; but instead let herself become more aware. The place smelled like _him,_ but I also smelled like someone else who didn't stink so badly. It must've been the person cleaning her. They took shallow, but not fast, breaths. And they were gentle as they moved over face. The cloth was taken away to rinse and wring. The person dabbed Clarice's jaw, then continued down her neck. 

Clarice opened her eyes and saw the person - another girl, who looked back at her and whose hand froze in place. Slowly, Clarice reached for her wrist and carefully removed it from her neck. As she did, the other girl snapped out of her daze and pulled her hand away on her own.

"I'm so sorry," she started to say, with an accent that sounded strange to Clarice's ear. "You were asleep for a long time, and I didn't want you to get dirty and sick so I've been cleaning you. I thought you might die. I'm glad you woke up."

"Thanks..." the teleporter's mouth and throat were drier than when McCoy put her on pills. "Who're you?"

"Four seven two nine five."

Damn. During the years she had been in the Pens, Clarice had noticed that the most broken prisoners could only refer to themselves as the number tattooed to their wrist. They either forgot their name, or were too afraid to say it in case they got punished. "You been penned awhile?"

The girl shook her head and rinsed the rag in a bowl again. Her brows were pulled together, like she was really thinking and trying to remember something, but like it hurt to try. "...ana...Illyana." She gave Clarice the cloth. "I am Illyana Rasputina. From Russia originally."

Clarice nodded and smiled, taking the cloth and cleaning her own neck and pointed ears. Maybe Illyana wasn't very hurt after all. "Clarice Ferguson. From the Dark Beast's pens. Dunno whatcha call it 'fore Apocalypse."

"America?" Illyana suggested.

"That sounds right."

Illyana nodded. "That's what Sugar called it once." She looked away while Clarice scrubbed down her chest. "I had to clean your...your...between your legs, and inside you below your back with a cream so you didn't get sick. I'm sorry."

Clarice felt sick when Illyana told her that, even though the girl was just trying to help. "It's okay. Thanks."

Illyana rinsed the cloth for her again, and looked away when Clarice cleaned herself down there. Even if she was completely nude and the girl had already cleaned her before anyways, it was still...private. When Clarice was finished with the cloth she put it back in the water and moved the dirty water to the other side of the room. She came back onto the bed because it was warm. Illyana sat with her legs up against her chest and her chin on her knees, and watched the older girl.

That's when Clarice realized how little the other one was. "How many years are ya?" she asked, clear films blinking over black eyes.

Illyana thought about that a little. "I think twelve years."

Blink shuddered. Illyana looked skinny enough to be six. "How many years has he been...?"

The other girl paled and then reddened, looking away. "Maybe two."

She nodded, anger welling inside her. Monster. Th' man was a damn monster. 

Illyana moved forward and up to Clarice, hesitating. "Can I be close? I'm cold."

"Hold on-" Blink went up near the headboard and pulled up part of the thin blanket, going under it. "Okay, here."

The little Russian girl crawled under the blanket against the older teleporter. "I'm sorry. About cleaning you."

"It's okay. I'm glad you did," Clarice reassured, hugging her gently. "I woulda been sick if ya hadn't. It was good to do. Thanks."

"Are you a faya, Clarice?" Illyana turned a bit to look at her.

"What's a faya?" she blinked, looking back.

"It's a magic girl who flies. You have faya ears."

"Oh. I don' fly," Clarice frowned.

"I think you're a faya." Illyana decided, curling into a ball against the other.

"Are you a faya?" the older girl asked.

"Maybe," she said, yawning. She fell asleep beside Clarice.

Blink couldn't sleep, as relaxing as it was to be warm and close to another person. She was too uneasy, knowing that he could come in any moment. If she were awake an' Illyana were asleep, maybe he would hurt her instead o'the younger girl.So Clarice stayed awake to protect the younger girl.

\------------

**Three Months Ago...**

"Ah, yes, such a sweetheart, aren't you?" The kitten - barely two weeks old yet - pushed against him, to utterly no avail. The frail thing could hardly budge the doctor's hands. "Mhm. An absolute sweetheart, performing oh so well. If you survive, I might reward that. Somehow. Perhaps."

"Sir?"

Henry gave the squirming, mewling little kitten one last pet, ignoring the man standing in the lab several feet behind him. He held the cat down with two fingers as he attached the electrical cable to it, watching with satisfaction as it clawed at the air trying to get upright again. It figured it out eventually, stumbling along the desk on its stiff legs. It paused when the doctor first turned on the machine, likely feeling a tiny shock remaining from the last litter's experiments. He turned the voltage on juuuust enough to send a jolting little buzz through its miniature frame, setting the little puff of fur amewl. This was the tempering shock, the one which got a brisk current jogging through the subject's bones and delayed the sudden fatality of higher voltages. It's body would go ito shock if it wasn't at least a little introduced to...well, shock.

With a pleasant hum, he pulled off his gloves and stuffed them into his pocket. His hands settled by his sides as he looked over the young man whom he now faced. "Well, well. You, of course, are here as a control volunteer?"

Henry, of course, had already deduced that the boy wasn't here to volunteer for experiments. That didn't take a genius to figure out - everyone knew it would be stupid to put themselves at Henry's mercy. What was more difficult to conclude was that the boy was a student. He didn't have enough years on him to have experience as a nurse, and wasn't bulky enough to be a guard. He was probably barely trained in combat, even. Nor was the man a news reporter - there were only two newspapers now: Apocalypse Now and the Daily Bugle. A reporter from Apoc Now wouldn't bother with Henry except maybe to take a picture. They'd talk to Essex. As for the Bugle, they'd be dead at the gates. So, probably, a student of the sciences, perhaps seeking information for an essay. 

The youth seemed able to hold his own, neither paling at a threat nor flushing indignantly red. He managed a straight face, even a laugh, and held his head up. "No sir, Doctor McCoy. I thought all the positions were taken." Good, Henry appreciated a sense of humor. "Joshua Foley, sir. I'm applying for an apprenticeship in genetics. I hoped to learn under you, if you'll have me."

"I see. Has your university not directed you to the several less-experienced, less-important, and less-brutal geneticists for training?" Henry asked. In the last six years, not a single student had approached him for apprenticeship. Why this one? 

"Yes sir," Joshua answered, eyes glancing down for a barely noticeable length of time. Henry noticed. "But I figured if I'm going to work hard to get somewhere, a jump up the ladder of guides will help me get there faster."

Hmmm. "Generally yes, that experiment tends to yield good results. Why not jump even higher, then? Why not approach someone like oh, say...Sinister?" If his voice dropped a little and there was a growl in his chest when Henry mentioned his own 'mentor', so to speak...well.

"Well, sir, I've heard Dr Essex is very particular about keeping rules and doesn't like anyone else working on his projects." Joshua tried to word it carefully so as not to be offensive towards the Horseman. He rubbed the back of his neck. "You, on the other hand - I was hoping, at least...you wouldn't mind so much. I think. And you have less political distraction."

"...and therefore more time for an apprentice to tag along and actually learn things," Henry completed the broken train of thought. This about breaking the rules, jumping ladders, spending maximum time with the tutor... The man was in a rush. "Valid concerns. What is your mutation, by the by?" He paused a moment and then asked further, "...you do _have_ a mutation, correct?"

"Yeah, I do," he answered quickly - a slip in formality, hm. His formality, then, was put on. "I have an Alpha Class mutation of biokinesis. I can manipulate biological material and heal. It takes a lot of my energy, but I'm training in stamina."

Oh...ohhh _my_. The things he could _do_ with that... Henry frowned and thought a moment, fingers of one hand to his chin.

"Mmmm...I'm tempted, really, but I hardly have the time to train up a partial-control. Good luck, Mr. Foley," he shrugged, turning to walk away and over to the tests which had just finished processing. _He'll bite._

"Wait, Doc-" Joshua followed and stepped in front of McCoy. "Please, I'll do any job you want me to, I'll even...okay, even if you don't need me, you could still pretend to be training me over six months and sent me away with a letter of reference. Please. I have to have a position with you."

 _Hook, line and sinker._ "What are you afraid of Joshua?" Henry asked directly after a pause. "Unemployment, irrelevence? Your family starving to death?" 

The man didn't reply. Either he had family starving to death, or he had none. Assuming he had none, why was he rushing?

"Are you dying, Mr Foley?"

"Excuse me, sir?" Joshua asked, brow furrowed in confusion. He seemed too honestly stunned to be lying.

"Dying. As of disease, in a diagnosed amount of time."

"Oh. No sir."

"Is one of your family members dying?

"No sir."

"Do you _have_ family, Mr Foley?"

Joshua shifted in discomfort. "...no sir."

That's what he thought. "A university graduate will have a diploma. I will see it."

Joshua shifted his weight to another foot. "I have yet to graduate, sir."

"Oh, I _see_." No family, little mutation control training, no diploma, nothing to offer. Why was he reaching for something? "You want to jump the gun, finish before the rest of your colleagues come pouring out looking for a job. Ambitious of you. And stupid. Tell me, Joshua, why should I bother with a student of unfinished education? Why should I let you near my patients?"

"Sir, with all respect, I would have the same experience with patients at the end of schooling as I have now - which is none. I have one year left of school - I know the basics, and I'm a quick study. I'll learn what you have to show me quickly. Additionally sir, I can watch and assist rather than operate."

Joshua was interesting, and his points were sound. He could resist a good verbal hazing. Tough little nail. Henry clasped his hands behind his back. What drove the boy? What was he reaching for? He wanted a few months at least to figure him out. "I will accept your application. Inform the university that I require your presence for three of your seven study days per week."

"Sir, I can't-" Joshua said, stepping forward. He corrected himself quickly, adjusted his tone, stood straight. "I can't complete my studies in four days."

Henry arched a brow and approached the boy in a calm, steady pace. "You are attempting to cut corners, Joshua. This is the fare for your fast route. If you can't get it done in four days, _work harder_."

\------------

**Now...**

Blink began to drift into a light sleep after an hour or so, just heavy enough to dream. She used to dream a lot about home, but the memories from her childhood were quickly fading. When she dozed, this time, it was a heart-warming relief to get a glimpse of that before the disorder started. She dreamt of a warm, tender touch flooded in the sun's kind rays, the smell of light perfume and someone clean and...home-feeling. "I love you, baby," a woman's voice said, and Clarice pressed against her to hug her.

She drifted partway out of that dream, back into the monster's bed, and then down into another image. His smell overwhelmed her space, made her feel like gagging, made her feel panicked. She ran, and ran, but he was close behind her. She could hear him snarling threats. She felt herself hit the ground and noticed that it was black. She could see through it like through a window. Ten searing lines were torn into her torso, then nails - claws - grabbed and spread her cheeks. Something hard and wet and slimy pushed into her butt hole painfully and lapped at the inside. She watched the mean guard - Jude, was that his name? - laugh at her through the floor, hurting Illyana. Clarice couldn't scream. She wanted to help the girl-

Everything dissolved into chaos. Illyana was standing nearby, and Clarice grabbed her. The two of them ran. Clarice smelled a sweet shop and when she looked around, she saw mutants trashing it. "Go to the harbor. Don't look back, Clarice," the woman's voice said in her ear, wrenching her heart with its kindness. No one had been kind for so long. "I love you."

Clarice looked forward and pulled Illyana along. They ran and ran, and then a portal happened in front of them, a huge portal. A purple girl with milky white eyes and a torn green dress floated on top of it. Her hair was pulled out. She didn't want them to run for safety. She wanted to kill them so that they didn't hurt anymore. She was giving up. Clarice looked around for a way to get past the portal. She looked back, and saw a second portal, the same size as the first. The purple girl on top of it had flashing green eyes and a black dress. She wanted to rip apart everything - Sugar Man, McCoy, Sinister, Apocalypse, Jude and Lee, the pens. She wanted them to go through the portal to somewhere safe, away from those things. But the portals were getting closer to her and Illyana, both of them starting to tear the two girls apart...

Clarice awoke with a start. She heard footsteps coming close, familiar ones. She pinched herself to make sure she was awake. She was. Illyana woke up too. She gently covered the younger girl's mouth and told her to close her eyes. "Shhh. Pretend you're asleep, until he wants you." Illyana nodded.

Blink crawled out of the covers and fixed them over the other girl's nudity, and lay down on her side, facing away from the door - a position she never, ever took, but it would be distracting for him to look at.

The door opened, and in stepped the girls' nightmare. Blink closed her eyes tightly when Sugar Man stopped, expecting some sort of pain. She opened them and breathed when he closed the door.

"Lookiewho's awake now, hm?" he sneered. "Yerstill alive, no surprise."

Blink looked over her shoulder, trying not to seem afraid. But he grinned widely, all teeth showing, and she had a feeling that her fear was nowhere near concealed.

The man stepped forward and picked Blink up by her arm, very nearly twisting it out of its socket. She cried out. He cackled at the pained sound. "Nowsweet, it's no good to whine like that. Where'syour little friend, hm? Didyou expect to hide her from me? Ill-y-annna!" he called out in a singsong voice, snorting when the other girl lifted her head just a little and looked at them.

Sugar Man tossed Clarice back onto the bed, and his long tongue slipped out to flick at the younger girl's cheek, snaking away when he heard her whimper.

"Whydon't you show our new guest the nice little tricks you've learned, pretty girl?"

Blink's heart sank as Illyana moved stiffly toward her. "I don't wanna see the tricks," she said to Sugar Man. His grin contorted into a gruesome snarl, and he curled his tongue around her neck. She cried out in pain at a sudden jolt of energy from the appendage.

"Toobad, pink. Yergoing to see them anyway."

After that, Clarice's nightmare came back in full force. He fucked Illyana while his tongue slid in and put of Blink, tearing tight muscle again. He must love her screams like McCoy did, she thought vaguely at some point.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> According to google (and if I could find out for sure I would), the Russian translation of fairy/faery is faya.


	2. Induce

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If you're here for the Josh and Henry bits, you'll like this one. If you're here for Clarice, don't worry, she's okay. If you're here for Illyana...sorry man. If you're here for the plot?
> 
> *manic cackles and sinister hand gestures*  
> IT'S DEVELOPING ^.^

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Warnings: medical torture (of sorts), non-graphic non-sensual rape and gang-bang, graphic depictions of violence, Holocaust-similar environs and events, racism and racial discrimination, genocide, mention of drug-like high, non-sensual bondage, physical abuse, a couple swears in non-dialogue.

**One Month Ago...**

"Oh Nurse!" Henry sing-songed as he entered the lab. Josh looked up from the track-chip implant surgery he was currently performing. A pair of armed guards followed his mentor into the lab, an unconscious mutant dragging between them. "We're going to try a little experiment, you and I, just for fun."

"Okay, I'll be right there, I just have to-"

"Leave the patient. They'll be fine - or they won't and you can fix them. Over here," Henry beckoned him over as the guards strapped it down to another medical table.

Joshua frowned and hesitated. He should finish placing the implant and close the wound. But he'd tried disobeying to help a patient already, and Henry didn't like that. He pulled off his gloves and approached. "What are we doing?"

"I'm testing your limits," McCoy stated openly, palms spread as if showing the man he had nothing to hide. "Get a feel for this one's biological structure."

Foley frowned at the geneticist, but placed his golden-skinned hands and focused on the patient for several moments. "Mutant, beta-class, capable of filtering toxins from consumables for itself. Male. Unconscious from sedative. Strong immune system, strong organs, weak musculature as from atrophy. What am I looking for?"

"Oh, you're not _looking_ for anything," Henry grinned darkly and gleefully. "I want you to corrupt the immune system."

His hands shot away from the patient, shocked. This was the first time Henry had told him to straight-out harm a patient. "No way. I'm not doing that."

Dark Beast sighed and rolled his eyes, tapping his foot. "Joshua, you said you wanted to learn from me. If you want to give up your apprenticeship and be shunned by the university and future mentors, I'll be more than happy to be rid of you. And to laugh at your self-induced humiliation."

Foley crossed his arms, the insults bouncing off him harmlessly. "I won't get a bad rep from following the Hippocratic Oath."

Henry looked at him for a long moment. Then he suddenly burst out laughing, head thrown back. It died off, and then he looked at Josh and started snickering again. He took a breath and laughed again, wiping his eyes. "The - hah - Hippocratic Oath? They still teach that in the university?"

Joshua didn't answer, certain he was about to be further mocked.

"Hippocrites is two and a half thousand years dead, Mr Foley, and medicine has evolved drastically since his death. Human beings were performing genetic experiments on each other and mutants for at least thirty years before Apocalypse arrived - few of those experiments under consent, even fewer painless. Your professors won't be at all shocked to hear that your unique abilities are being used to 'further the evolution of mutantkind' - on the contrary, they'll be pleased: this all fits in so nicely to the new 'politically correct' themes dear Apoc has been indoctrinating everyone with. The Hipporatic Oath has been merely a nice, pleasant, moral standard entirely ignored by the general medical profession in favor of risky treatments and self-promotion for decades. It's a facade for the civilians and patients and the generally uneducated populous. Why they even teach it anymore is beyond me, as all of the medics they're growing are going to be doing just what I am if they can find jobs. On that note, I should hand you some literature sometime to study on the 'malpractice' and 'medical torture' of not-so-ancient times. For now, tend to the human."

Joshua couldn't help but feel increasingly discouraged by McCoy's speech. It sounded like his mentor drew a sardonic pleasure from ripping apart the morality on which doctors had shakily stood for the last century. It also sounded like he had no respect for the institution that had schooled Josh, for the evolution of mutants, or for Apocalypse himself and the leader's instructions - all things the young man had formulated his self-image on since he had been taken in by the education system. "Can I ask you a bunch of questions, later?" Joshua said, trying to piece together just what, exactly, his instructor believed.

Henry snorted. "Later. Destroy the body's immune system first."

Joshua nodded and begrudgingly replaced his hands, sifting through the mutant's form. The appendix was his first target - he caused it to swell but not burst. He corrupted the spleen, weakened the bone marrow. The tonsils would have to be removed. He attacked the lymph nodes and vessels, thymus and adenoids, Payer's patches. When he pulled away, he felt weak. The mutant was now that much weaker. Josh opened his eyes. His face contorted in anger at Dark Beast.

"There. He has tonsillitis and appendicitis now and his bone marrow's weak, T-cell count is under twenty, he's susceptible to anything. Happy now?"

"Ecstatic," Henry smirked, sounding every bit honest. He pulled a box out of his lab jacket. "Prep the patient for injection."

He clenched his fists, feeling adrenaline race through his own bloodstream in his anger. He swabbed the patient's arm with topical antiseptic. "Prepped."

"Yes, Mr Foley, I see that," Henry rolled his eyes, purposely mocking the man's formality. Foley grit his teeth. McCoy slowly injected the fluid from one syringe in the box. Josh immediately felt the sickness invade the body, spreading throughout in a matter of minutes.

"What the hell are you doing?" he growled at McCoy, feeling ready to hit the older man.

"Oh, you're well aware of what I'm doing. That was an active, highly adapted strain of H1N1 virus. You've weakened the body enough that it will be susceptible and unable to self-defend, as you yourself have stated," Henry told him, pulling out another syringe and popping the cap. "With a virus present, the next ingredient will latch on to the red cells like a baby to a mother's nipple. Which reminds me, I should show you the breeding section of the Pens sometime-"

"You son of a-" Josh yelled, stepping forward and throwing a fist at the geneticist.

With considerable ease, Henry caught the appendage and used the force of Joshua's movement to propel the man to the floor. He pleasantly stepped forward to kick him solidly in the gut, expression twisting into anger. "I could have you incarcerated for assaulting a Prelate, Josh," he said in a sickly-sweet tone - one he might use to tell a child a horror story at bedtime. "But you see, I don't mind violence so much. You're angry, I understand - but morals are useless here. Again: you can quit anytime. You're an Alpha, you have that right."

Joshua stood up, favoring his gut as it healed and glaring at McCoy. "How can you do this? Day in day out. How can you do this to people?"

"Pot and kettle, Mr Foley," Henry hummed, injecting the fluid into the patient. "Now if you'll pay attention."

"I'm not the same as you at all."

"Sure you are. Look at yourself, Joshua. You've gained a skin condition from hurting some poor, helpless, sedated mutant, oh my." He said the last bit along to the tune of 'lions and tigers and bears.' 

Josh looked as he was told and was shocked to see patches of his skin were pitch black and shiny. "What the hell did you do to me?"

"Oh that was none of mine. I'd rather have you grow another head," Henry snorted. "Your skin turns gold when you heal, obviously this is what happens during the opposite. But enough about _your_ body, what about the patient's, hm?"

Joshua frowned at the change occurring in the patient. He had no clue what it could be, but it was happening in the X-gene. He felt something unlock, and then felt the change sweep through the body. The skin grew a fine layer of scales and the teeth drew into points, more teeth growing in rows behind the front one. The eyes grew a nictitating membrane and gills formed in the neck, which thickened. A gall bladder emerged, the oxygenation system of the body changed, the fingers became webbed, the feet grew sails. Ampullae of Lorenzini appeared, genitalia changed drastically. And with the change came a renewal of the immune system...except the bones turned to cartilage.

"It's- it's a shark," he breathed. The change in the body was amazing to feel - those were endorphins rushing to his head. Wow. He was high. On evolution. On medical torture. _Gosh, that's sick._

"It's been affected by very private information that cannot be publicly revealed," Henry corrected.

"It needs water. It's having trouble breathing."

"Oh, and I have spare tanks set aside of purified seawater for just such an occasion," McCoy snapped sarcastically. "It will die. The correct environment is too costly to supply and sustain. You're missing the point."

"What's the point?" Joshua asked tiredly. He was exhausted from caring.

"I can tell you what happened - why the body changed - if you do not share your new knowledge with the public. If you do, it won't be _me_ hunting you down and killing you, of course, it will be _Apocalypse_. Or, you can say you don't want to hear it and I'll have to exclude you from ninety percent of my projects for the safety and preservation of the information."

"So _now_ you care about politics?" Josh groaned.

Henry smirked. "I care about covering my ass. If I've already told you that it's illegal to share publicly, my responsibility is over. I don't take the blame if you do share."

He stared for a minute. "You know the Apocalyptic Law, don't you?"

"Mm. Not out of actual _care_ or _regard_ , mind you - it's just useful. You, of course, know it because it's a required study."

"Yeah," Josh nodded. He thought about that high - totally gone now that the adaptation had finished. He wanted to know what happened. He really did. "Tell me about the thing."

Henry clapped his hands together and rubbed them excitedly. "Induced secondary mutation, my personal brainchild. Secondary mutation is natural, occurring in one out of fifty mutants and usually triggered by trauma, usually occuring in late teens and those in early twenties. The number has increased dramatically over the last six years - presumably because of bio-geo-social causes. The cullings have bitten off a large chunk of human population and mutants are closer together, which has had the effect of heightening the average class mutation, average strength, average agility...and average number of secondary mutations."

Joshua held up his hands. "Too much info. So...secondary mutations come from high mutant population. Yes?"

"That is one of the factors, yes. Others are trauma, age, radiation levels, diet. How much longer do you need to think?"

"I think I'm fine now. What is secondary mutation?"

"You know what initial mutation is?"

Josh nodded. "The human's X-gene is activated by internal and/or external factors. It's basically when something already existing and dormant is unlocked and made active."

"Exactly. The _secondary_ mutation is essentially the same; except that the trigger unlocks a more prominent mutation than is already active."

"Okay," Josh said. "So you've made a trigger."

"Precisely! You've finally arrived at the important part. An inducer, to be terminologically correct," Henry explained excitedly, gleefully. "Now let me fill you in on some information I am personally privy to, along with only a handful of other people. It really is quite fun..."

\------------

Clarice fought Sugar Man tooth and nail a few days after waking up, when Sugar Man again insisted that she say she enjoyed all this. She spat in his face, hit, kicked, bit down, punched his eye. She'd rather die fighting than to just take it and lie. 

Instead of dying, she'd been thrown across the room, the back of her head hitting the wall with force. She'd lost consciousness for two more days. He didn't wait until she was awake to use her this time. When she woke up, Illyana told her her eyes looked like a faya's now.

Illyana didn't fight. Couldn't, wouldn't, didn't. She was too little, too fragile. Obedience kept her safe. Clarice understood that, and never shamed the girl for going along with their rapist's whims. She wished the girl didn't have to deal with this.

She learned a little about the child and Seattle Core when she was conscious. It was a sweat factory. Human and unfit mutant prisoners shoveled shit into generators, carried materials and provisions and dead bodies to places, put together broken vehicles, worked to keep water pumps functioning... every rote, dangerous, tedious, and generally unpleasant job was carried out by the prisoners here. They weren't isolated like in the Pens. Sometimes they killed each other. Children were assigned random jobs by whatever Dreg required help. Illyana spent most of her day running and carrying little things.

Besides all that, of course, there was the experimental part of the facility. Sugar Man collected energy, DNA, cultivated bacteria, revised viruses, and did basically everything that McCoy did. Except he didn't care about keeping patients alive for retrials, or about his hygiene. A lot more patients died here. And it was smelly and dark and filthy everywhere. The guards weren't usually in uniform. There wasn't much to keep anybody in line. She didn't like that.

Clarice was able to sleep a little more here, though. Even though Illyana was expected to slave through the day, the older girl wasn't. She wasn't allowed out of Sugar Man's room at all. So she got to sleep and do some pushups and things to keep her strong while the geneticist was away. It wasn't worth the rape, but it made it not quite so bad.

During the second week, when Sugar Man was busy with his daytime activities, Clarice was woken up by someone coming into the room.

Three someones.

Jude, Lee, and Peter.

They felt better all at once than Sugar Man had all by himself, but she still didn't want them. She still fought. She bared her teeth when Lee tried to open her jaw, and threatened to bite off whatever he put in there. They ended up shoving a wad of fabric into her mouth and taking turns doubling up in her holes. They must've emptied three times each into her.

Clarice couldn't even move to curl into a self-protective ball when they were finished and gone. Her sleep then came out of exhaustion, and it was full of fitful dreams. Sugar Man didn't seem to care about the guards' filth inside her. He took her anyway that night. At least she was stretched and wet and didn't tear that time.

Exactly two weeks from when Blink had first entered Sugar Man's personal quarters, he forced this metal ring into her mouth and fucked his dick into the hole. Clarice couldn't breathe, couldn't bite, could only choke and gag - which he didn't mind - and blink water from her eyes. Then he told her that he'd _loved_ having her over to visit; and he had her blindfolded and bound, and she was taken back to the stinking cargo deck of a carrier.

If the ride from the Breeding Pens to Seattle Core had been bad, the shipment from there back to the Pens was worse. At least the prisoners had been mostly alive coming from the Pens. From the Core, they were all starving and dehydrated, most of them severely burned and cut into, some amputated, some of them displaying complete insanity. Most of them were humans, rather than the Pen's high populous of low-powered mutants.

Clarice felt ill partway through the shipment. She realized she actually wanted to be back in the Breeding Pens. She missed the cold table and needles and wires, her loincloth and the cage she shared with other mutants. She missed being injected and sampled and drugged, instead of being fucked and injured and used.

She blinked back tears of relief when the carrier finally stopped moving. Couldn't let those show. She was strong. She'd been through the darkest pits of hell. Now she was simply moving to a slightly less dark pit.

The prisoners were met with a floodlight when the carrier door was opened. She saw rodents scramble out. Every prisoner who hung from the ceiling was lowered to the ground by some machine, but not unbound. That was done one at a time, by low-rank guards. The unbound prisoners would stand - or fall - in a line, one row at a time. Clarice got to witness the first row's fate as a pair of mid-rank guards hurriedly undid the chains that kept her attached to the ship's side. Out of six prisoners, only five could stand on their own. Only three could stand without wobbling. The three were walked off the platform by Sam Guthrie - Clarice knew of him and his sister from the other prisoners in the Pens. Liz Guthrie clubbed the other three to death, right there in the middle of the doorway. A pair of low-ranks picked up the corpses. Guthrie was spattered in blood already, blood that she wiped from her face with a cruel smile.

Clarice watched the entire thing, even when her limbs were free from shackles and she could move her head where she liked. She watched it. Someone had to watch. It couldn't just happen with no one to see.

She was dragged right past the pile of bodies while the second row were set on their feet. She realized what it meant now. "Survival of the fittest." It meant murder of the weakest. It meant she could never, ever, _not_ get up off of the ground. If she couldn't stand, she would die.

With that realization, she looked up, glancing around for the brute to whom she had now returned. Instead, she was handed to a man with pitch black skin and a clipboard. Her stomach sank. _Please no' a new monster._

"Where's Dr McCoy?" she asked him while he examined her visually.

The man made eye contact. "He's currently preoccupied. Please be quiet and cooperate with me. I'm Nurse Foley, by the way.

Clarice nodded. Just a nurse. Not an experimenter. She relaxed.

"It says here that you have black eyes, lidless, with a nictitating membrane."

She shrugged. "They changed."

He exhaled hugely and scribbled something on the clipboard. "Okay. Follow me, please."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so glad to be done with Two Weeks of Hell. Now back to the Pens and happy things.  
> *snorts*  
> Yes, I actually think torture is happy.


	3. The Desensitizing and The Hardening

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Long chapter here. This one is full of...well. More E-rated material. Focus on Foley, McCoy, Clarice, with a touch on the Bedlams and a mention of activity in Heaven (more implied than mentioned). See end-of-chapter note for more on that mention. 
> 
> I wanted to update this tomorrow (Sept 3rd), but I simply can't wait any longer.  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Warnings: Swearing, both in and out of dialogue; graphic description of horrific surroundings; mild gore; mentions of drug-like highs; derogatory female word used; objectification; semi-graphic sexual descriptions; homophobia and discrimination against/abuse of homosexuals; gossip; misogynism? Maybe?; mentions of insanity; medical malpractice; discussion of rape sortof; mention of rape.
> 
> Wow. This one's jam-packed.
> 
> As always, read at your own risk. I do, after all, write at mine.

**Circa. 0400 This Morning...**

"Hey, Dr McCoy-" Josh stopped full-throttle when he saw his mentor. Henry appeared barely mobile, and though clean, haggard. That would be the caffeine deprivation. Foley knew better by now than to engage the other man in conversation before 0700, so he shut up immediately and pulled off his self-knitted sweater, exchanging the garment for a lab coat. Henry, in the meantime, frowned at a sudoku and downed a mouthful of coffee every fifteen seconds, like it was a prescription.

After three minutes, Joshua brought the coffeepot over and refilled the now-empty mug.

Ten minutes later, Dark Beast actually started moving around. He topped up the mug himself. "Good morning, Joshua," he scowled bitterly. Weird. Henry was usually chipper by now.

"Good morning, Doc," he smiled, holding out the full clipboard for the morning rounds. He typically accompanied the geneticist on rounds the days he was working in the pens. Henry snatched it out of his hand - somewhat normal. "Uh...is something wrong?"

McCoy raised a brow at the young man, walking out of the lab through the poorly-lit hallway. "Completely... and yet I have no desire to explain it to you. Huh. How strange."

Josh rolled his eyes and followed the older man. "Yeah, so strange. It's almost like a student has no need to know why his mentor's pissed enough that he could murder the student at any time." That got a snort, followed by sullen silence. "Are we doing the breeding section or the experimental section first?"

"The breeders," Henry talked into his mug, then took a drink. "Apparently subject F-10587 went into labor after hours and birthed about twenty minutes ago. The infant will need examination."

"Wasn't F-10587 due six weeks from now?" the nurse scratched his head, looking at his own clipboard.

"Yep."

"So it's either premature or accelerated development." Josh said, tapping his pen on the board. He frowned, puzzled. "Wait a sec, don't you usually work through the night? You would've known if a female went into early labor."

"Astute observation, Watson," Henry grumbled. His notifier beeped and he checked it. Perfect escape from the kid's inevitable pestering. He smiled at Joshua and took on a suddenly pleasant tone,"Why don't you hurry on ahead, hm? The Bedlams have just happened upon bedlam. Section H-6, west cage. They might be in need of medical assistance."

"Yeah, I'm sure. I'm not forgetting, Doc," Foley griped, and threw a troublesome smirk at Henry.

"Try not to vomit," the other man trolled with mock concern and waved 'ta-ta'.

Josh flipped the bird at him and picked up his speed to a jog. _Three more months before he outs me. Thank fucking Christ._

Joshua braced himself as he got closer to the section of the pens set aside for production. All along the hallways were individual medical cells for experimental patients, but the agony that reverberated off their nerves came just a dozen at a time. Foley had easily learned how to block them out. It had taken far longer to condition himself to the anguish that battered his biokinesis in the breeding section of the Breeding Pens. Because, of course, with the ability to manipulate bodies came the ability to sense their exact state and feel - along with the other person - the physical reaction to that state.

Most of those in the breeding pens were in excruciating pain from having frustrated erection, torn and battered inner walls, infections from feculence (a word he'd discovered through McCoy, of course), raw and chafed skin, over-stretched wombs, under-nourished infants, starving bitches who'd birthed so many babies already that their bodies were depleted. All of the pain from all of these conditions, Joshua felt all at once. It had taken him a five-minute trip all three days a week for the first three weeks to keep from vomiting uncontrollably, having a panic attack, or passing out altogether from the sheer pain. It had taken another month to be able to stay an hour without getting a splitting migraine. Finally, he could now ignore the torture almost completely - except for that crawling of his skin while he resisted the feeling of...well...everything everyone else felt - for about five hours. In fact, he could ignore it so well that he could nearly ride the pleasure bursts of constant orgasm...that endorphine high that lasted a short span of seconds before it fizzled out.

So yes, he braced himself. He rode a nice, long high when one of the cells he passed seemed to have a communal orgasm. And he winced at the thorough beating a male in west H-6 was getting. As usual when a male breeder got beaten, it was for instigating sexual activity with another male instead of a female. Josh wished they wouldn't do that when the guards were on shift. There were enough people in pain already, no need to make it worse. 

"...forty-nine. Alright, Jesse, cut it."

Jesse stopped beating the man after one last blow to the nose. The man could barely move when Jesse got off of him. Josh had discovered a while ago that fifty beats, whether by hand, lash, tonfa, etc., was the maximum punishment for a prisoner's first homosexual offense - he shuddered, also remembering that the tenth offense was death. The Bedlams always gave the max, never over, never without cause. They'd only do a bit over the minimum if the prisoner couldn't take more.

Jesse picked the guy up and shoved him back into his pen. "You do it again, you won't be able to feel your balls. Understand?"

The prisoner nodded, wiping the dark, clotting stream of blood from his nose.

The cage door closed.

"You-" Terry said to the other male prisoner, the one who would've been on the receiving end of the beaten man's cock. "Put that to use on one of the women you're supposed to be breeding."

"Hey, Josh. Tried to be careful about it," Jesse said to the guy when they started leaving the pen.

"Yeah, he's fine. Well, not _fine_ , but he'll live and self-heal." Joshua shrugged. He didn't have stamina to waste on some bruised skin.

His own action gave him pause. When did he just start _accepting_ that some bodies were in pain and he didn't need to help them? 

When did he start thinking of them as just bodies?

"Hey, you guys have any clue what the Doc was working on last night?" he asked offhandedly. "He's weird this morning."

Terrence snickered. Jesse grinned widely. "Oh that? Heh. Ole Henry got himself a date at Heaven. The pretty little master, too-"

Joshua was staring mouth-agape. " _That guy_ actually _dates?_ "

Terrence laughed harder. "Yeh, sure, he 'dates'. The closest McCoy's ever gettin' to a 'date' is his playing with Dog. Jesus fucking Christ."

"Woop, got another disturbance. See ya, Foley!" Jesse smiled at Joshua and Terry followed his brother, shaking his head and muttering 'date.'

"See ya! Hey, how come it's just the two of you today?"

"You ask too many questions, Foley!" Jesse said at the same time Terry said "There's shipping today!"

Well that made sense, then, Josh figured, heading to the six-weeks-due section. He didn't breathe a word to Henry about the suspicious night out when he found the Doc leaning back against a support column and watching the cell of females with arms crossed over his chest and an inquisitive, eerie curiosity in his expression.

Josh didn't breathe a word about anything. He just came to stand beside Henry, puzzling at what could be so compelling about a crop of women, mostly sitting, who had been suffering sensitive leaky nipples, mood swings, and who looked like they had all swallowed balloons. All of them sweaty, all of them nude. Well, all except for 10587. She was sweaty, nude, had blood dried inside her thighs, and had an ugly, wrinkly little green baby sucking on her tit. Somewhere in there, maybe the scene could be considered erotic - all flesh and fleshy and soft and wriggling. But Josh forced his mind to stay away from there.

"You know what's so interesting about women, Joshua?" Henry spoke in a low tone, arching a brow at one of them and letting a cruel little smirk play about his lips for another. Josh looked up at him, expectant. "Their imagination is limitless."

Okay...that's not really what he was expecting. The student frowned. Henry elaborated.

"If I smile at you, what do you think?"

"I guess you're happy about something," Joshua shrugged. "Except when you're really obviously telling me I'm stupid. Then the smile means you think I'm stupid."

"Do you know what a woman thinks, Joshua?" Henry turned to look at him. He looked cluelessly back.

"Um...that you're happy about something?"

"A woman thinks that I could be happy, yes. She also thinks that I could think she's stupid. She wonders if she's done something to please me, she wonders if I'm pretending to be disappointed. 'Is my rack too small? Is my ass too big? Is he planning to kill me today? Does he like how I look? Does he like me? Is he going to rape me? Is he going to string me up and watch his guards shred me to bits?'"

Josh swallowed tightly. Henry went on.

"It's quite a feat to try to surpass a woman's imagination, you see, because they think of everything, of things that wouldn't ever cross your mind, in a circumstance that has absolutely nothing to do with them. She's thinking all these thoughts because you're smiling. You're smiling because you like the tie you're wearing. As simple a thing as that, and she'll come up with a score of reasons, macabre and hopeful alike, to explain it. They connect everything to everything else. Which is no fault of theirs, of course," Henry noted, looking back at the heap of flesh. "That's simply how their brains work. They can't help thinking the way they do. But there is plenty of good fun to be had with a woman's mind, all because of her wonderful imagination."

Josh just stared at him for a second, stunned. He felt like he had just blundered into a very think fog full of psychedelics. "How do you think of this stuff?"

"My point exactly, Mr Foley," the geneticist winked. Slightly more seriously, he replied. "I specialized my genes to need less than an hour of sleep per day. I have much more time to ponder. And to listen to hundreds of their drug-enhanced rants and raves and deepest desires...Secrets about the soul are marvelous things, Joshua." Henry sighed contentedly.

"You sound batshit insane," the younger man bluntly stated. "If I hadn't already learned from the last three months that you're completely lucid and just love breaking things - that this is just an example of who you really are, deep down inside - I would think you were legit crazy."

"Mm, aren't you glad that I know what I'm doing?" he smirked. 

"Oh yeah. Yeah, it's totally better that you have a scalpel that you use carefully at appropriate times instead of randomly running around gouging people's eyes out with a scalpel."

"We have responsibilities to tend to, Joshua, or did you forget?" he changed the subject with a harsh twinkle in his eye. "Let's remove mother and babe from the flock and then see how well she gives up her lamb."

At least the Doc was in a better mood now.

\-------------

She obeyed coming out of the cage only after the baby was done feeding.

Henry sighed at the woman. "Haven't you heard of 'burping' a baby?"

The question was rhetorical. No, of course she hadn't. The surviving women here had practically grown up in the pens, no one to give them advice except other women. The lot F-10587 was in were all new-birthers - he'd have to make sure a couple experienced ones were in there sometime. None of them knew how to take care of their children. Which was more or less fine, as the babies were removed as soon as they weaned. The less-fine part was that the infant could get colicky, which was irritating as hell.

He reached to pick up the baby and the mother shied away. Henry kept his arms out and sighed, eyebrow arched. The woman looked him over and hesitated. He was going to help it, after all, wasn't he? If there was anything that really mattered, it was the next generation of mutants. She stepped forward even though her expression conveyed that she wanted to do anything _but_ that, and let McCoy take the infant. He held it up in the air a moment to examine the underparts - her - and then placed her facing her mother's shoulder, showed the young woman how to hold her and rub and pat her back.

"After every feeding," he stated firmly, ensuring that she knew it was a requirement. "Now then. The baby looks healthy, you look fine, 10587. Give it a name and hand it to Nurse Foley here while you get a hose-down."

The woman looked at her baby for a moment and smiled sadly. "Abigail."

She, of course, didn't want to give the little creature to the nurse, but did anyways. She didn't want to leave the room for a hose-down, but she did anyways, following a guard. And that's when Henry turned to Josh and promptly stared ordering his apprentice about. They headed immediately to the nearby clinic area.

"Take a blood sample, first off - and be extremely cautious, Foley, it only has a little over a cup of blood and it's very premature. It's a wonder the lungs are even open."

Josh set to work quickly and carefully, following instruction to the 't'. Henry pondered, not for the first time, how wonderfully the boy performed. That driving force was there, always spurring him on. And McCoy still hadn't discovered what that force was. Damn.

"We'll test the blood for mutation strength and specifics. Now clean it, with the filtered water. I'll get a blanket. It's very important that the X-positive babies survive."

"Why not incubate it to make sure, then? Keep it under eye in the lab?" Josh asked, again doing as told.

"Because the mother's milk is important to her development, Joshua, especially as premature," Henry explained impatiently. "It'll stave infection, aid in brain growth, supply all the nutrients the baby needs. Which is why both mother and infant are being moved to an indie cell and the mother's extra portions will be maintained until the feeding is over. She has to have enough nutrients to pass on."

"...the mother's a machine, then," the younger man paused suddenly. "She's only there to get the mutant healthy. Then she's gone to make another one."

"Precisely. Now, you have approximately two minutes to get that done before the mother's shower is over. Hurry up."

\------------

**Later This Morning...**

When rounds were done - a good several hours into the day - they sat down for coffee. Henry didn't take to long to get brooding again. Josh bit his tongue to keep from asking again, knowing that bringing it up would probably discourage talk. Eventually, McCoy did stir and grabbed an apple from the small fridge in the lab - someone kept it well-stocked and cleaned - and a paring knife out of the scarce drawer of utensils. He sat back down and leaned over, beginning to peel in one long strand from the top.

Josh watched the Doc get halfway down the apple. He startled when the older man finally spoke.

"There is a carrier coming in at 1400. You will have to leave at 1300 to get to the transit field in time. The Guthries will escort you. I want you to personally pick up a patient for me."

He was mildly stunned and confused, just for a moment. "Okay. Why?" Henry gave him an unimpressed glare. "I mean, you never personally pick up patients. I've seen you inspect them in groups, but never individually. Why's this one so important?"

The other kept staring at him with those keen, murder-experienced blue eyes, and Foley got uneasy. Then Henry sighed and trimmed the last piece of peel from the apple. "The patient is an Alpha with high teleportation ability, and is a long-term experiment that I was recently forced to loan out to a clumsy hack-saw scientist. I want to ensure that the patient arrives in decent condition and is not handled by brutish individuals. I will be preoccupied during that time."

It sounded like the Doc was leaving a lot of things out. 

"Okay," Josh nodded. "...anything else?"

"Don't heal her unless the wounds are fatal, just take down notes. I'll give you a clipboard with her description and ensure the guards know which number."

"Okay," he nodded again. "How come she's so important? You've got long-terms and a couple teleporters and stuff."

"That's none of your concern, Mr Foley."

\------------

**Now...**

"How come he likes you?" the nurse asked Clarice as he led her to her old cell.

The girl shrugged. "Dunno why. Didn't think he did, achully."

Joshua frowned. "Well, he does. Do you have any ideas in mind?"

"How come he likes _ya_?" she returned contentiously. "Ain't gotta thing ta do with fuckin', does it?"

Had his skin been a normal color, Josh would've turned tomato red. "No way in hell is that guy ever getting into my ass. I don't even think he likes other guys that way."

"So how come he likes ya?" Clarice persisted.

"I don't know."

"Got any idea?" she snorted.

He was actually getting a bit annoyed, and gave her a look that said so. He got a rebelliously grim smile from her. "McCoy likes anything that breathes and can't boss him around, so that he can tell it when to stop breathing and start again. Or make it stop altogether. He likes different things, too. Things that stand out. Anything interesting."

Clarice thought about that a moment. "Sounds right. So we stand out."

"Pretty much," he conceded.

They arrived outside her cell.

"Sorry to have you walk around like that. Henry's got some sort of fabric synthesizer working on something for you to wear. It'll take a couple hours," Josh explained. "For now, I need you to lie down on the med table so I can run a few tests."

"I ain't lyin' down for nobody," Clarice tensed, newly green eyes narrowed. "An' if Dark wants me lyin' down, he can damn well make me 'imself. Fuckin' pissant's got yella skin allova sudden."

He had no idea how the girl was so...rocky. "Okay. Will you sit, at least?" he asked, turning his back to her against his better judgement to prep a hypodermic needle and a couple other tools.

"Nope. Ya can take yer samples while I stand, can't ya?"

 _Good lord._ Josh looked at her. Crossed arms and frowny-face and everything. 

"Listen, Miss Ferguson-"

"Don' call me that. Jus' call me Clarice. T'other way's creepy."

"Clarice," Josh began again. "I didn't want to be harsh, okay. But you seem like you can take what you dish, so yeah, I'll be frank. You've been raped, more than once, and really badly. I can tell bodies, I can tell what yours is healing from. You need to lie down and get some rest."

The hardness disappeared like cataracts falling off eyes. She blinked a few times, swallowed, and didn't say anything. She didn't even have to. Joshua could tell that she was stuck between fear, panic, anger, humiliation, by the cocktail hormones swirling around. They made him edgy. Pain made him hurt, pleasure made him high, secondaries made him high, and all this other stuff made him uneasy.

"I'm sorry, Clarice."

"Fuck off," she mumbled, crawling onto the medical table and lying on her back when she would rather have laid on her side.

Josh felt a lot of remorse. Maybe he shouldn't have said that at all. He'd just reduced her into a near-catatonic vegetable. He used to be more sensitive, he thought. Maybe he hadn't actually been sensitive at all, and just hadn't realized it. He rubbed the back of his neck and started taking samples and examining.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> References of note: Abigail (Brand), Sherlock.  
> Also, it's at this point that I start taking ships and prompts for on-the-side drabbles. You want it, I'll write it. Eventually. Yes.
> 
> Look here: [ http://archiveofourown.org/works/4695518/chapters/10720688 ] for what the dear doc did last night  
> Toodles!


	4. Motivation, Manipulation, and Remorse of a Sort

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For What Henry Did Last Night That He Won't Tell Josh Ever, go here. 
> 
> [http://archiveofourown.org/works/4695518/chapters/10720688] (chapt. 1 and 2]
> 
> This Installment:
> 
> Joshua and Henry have a tense run-in.  
> Josh hides things  
> Henry takes the spotlight as The Universe's Be(a)st Manipulator  
> Clarice suffers more

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okayyyyy...
> 
> As per usual, the heck-load of Chapter Warnings:  
> Semi-graphic description of pregnancy; mild gore?; frequent mentions of rape; starvation/malnourishment; objectification; human breeding; racism; general horror; genocide; medical malpractice; medical torture; heavy swearing (like...the swearing gets worse every chapter, I swear. Heh. Guess it's kinda messed that I'm more uneased about it than the rest of the warnings o.O); in-character manipulation; homophobic slurs; slurs; politically incorrect character pretending to be politically correct to fuck up another politically incorrect character; crudity; slut shaming; victim-blaming; intimidation; blood....
> 
> That should be about it. *proudly posts realistically dark stories about horrific things*

"Patient's in her room," Josh stated, standing in the doorway and blocking out the pain of the birth and the cesarian McCoy was currently performing.

"Excellent. How did the pickup go?"  
The birther was dying.

"Well. She obeyed calmly, followed calmly, refused to lie down for tests, and finally did lie down when I told her she'd been _raped_ a dozen times. What the hell did you do to her?" Foley said snappishly.

" _I_ did nothing. The other scientist overstepped his boundaries and authority and misused and undervalued an important piece of genetic material. Wheel over that incubator." Henry trimmed the umbilical cord.

Joshua did so hurriedly, ending up standing right beside the dying woman. "Does she need healing?"

"No. This is her sixth birth. She's over her quota and too depleted to keep nourished," the doctor stated.

The nurse nodded. Five births was enough. After that, they were expendable...and usually needed more ration than when they were pregnant. As far as the breastfeeding factor... there were bitches set aside for just this circumstance who would supply milk.

He shuddered. Using all the right jargon, but the concept still sounded so wrong.

"What's the infant's mutation?" he asked, assuming it had one. Human babies weren't worth saving via surgery.

"Telepath," Henry frowned, washing the infant clean. "The mother could sense its thoughts - which of course were very minimal, consisting mostly of decisions to kick - at six weeks, when synapses first joined."

"Oh man," Josh said. That was amazing and wonderful and completely exciting from a medical science point of view, and totally interesting from a biokinetic point of view... Except... "So you're keeping it alive? We're not supposed to do that! Telepaths are to be killed the moment they're discovered!"

"Yes, Mr Foley, read back to me one of the first laws set into place," Henry grumbled. He flicked the drainage system in the incubator on, and then smirked. "Apocalypse tends to make exceptions for my projects. Which is, of course, a completely stupid habit to get into, but incredibly helpful on this end."

Joshua rubbed his forehead. "Okay, so...what's the project?"

"Well, an early-developing telepath like this will have high function by pre-teen years. We'll keep him unconscious for the greater part of his development and run his thoughts through a tele-compatible data collector. Then we'll offer his eyes stimulation and see how a telepath's mind responds, whether it differs from a regular mutant's. If it should breach its consciousness or injure anyone, of course, we immediately destroy it. And its energy output will be enormous, so we'll keep generators charging."

"That's nothing particularly exciting," John frowned.

"Precisely. Telepaths are nothing particularly exciting. And yet!" Henry and Josh began leaving now that the infant was hooked up to feeds and assigned a lackey nurse. "There's that certain thrill to committing illegal acts and getting away with them legally."

"How is this legal?"

"'If a mutant's powers do not put a reasonably-sized group of mutants in danger, that mutant may be spared from incineration.'"

"Doc...that's referring to energy-output...mutants," Josh trailed off, realizing the loophole. "Oh my god. You're an asshole, but you're brilliant."

"Mm. That's why they call me a _'beast'_ and a _'genius'_. It's really a very delicate balance."

"Yeah, sure," he mumbled. "Where are we going?"

"Not _we_. _You_ are going to turn right up here and continue to the track implant lineup, take care of _that_ dully repetitive chore for me," Henry said, smiling in mock-niceness.

Josh stopped at the corridor he knew led where he was supposed to go, and watched Henry continue for a couple steps. "Where are you going?"

"To tend my patient, Nurse Foley."

"Alone?" he asked, suddenly curious. He tagged along instead of turning off. "Why? What's the big secret? Do you _like_ her?"

Henry's brows touched his forehead. "Do _you_ like secondary mutations?" 

Josh almost froze. "...no." 

A smirk infiltrated the geneticist's expression, and he paused, turning to Foley face-on, close enough to touch with just a twitch. "Don't _lie_ to me, Joshua. How many inductions has it been? Six?" he spoke lowly, staring the young man down. "Did you _really_ think I'd miss the blissed-out whorish look on your face whenever a subjects goes secondary?" 

He swallowed thickly, unable to answer. Then he felt the subtle pheromones native to the McCoy being manufactured and pushed into the atmosphere. He zoned back in and looked up at the man. Was Henry aroused? Did he think those would work on the healer? Because they wouldn't. 

But he was smart. He would know they wouldn't work. The pheromones had to be uncontrolled. So the other man was aroused. 

And using really sexual language. 

_"Well,_ Joshua?" he said again. "Do you like secondary mutations? Or do you just choose that vital scientific moment to jerk yourself off?" 

Foley had no clue what to do. Nothing he could say would be smart enough to get the genius to stop talking. _What would I do if this were...I shouldn't even think his name. What would I do?_

He pulled Henry down and kissed him, eyes screwed shut, hoping the guy wouldn't goddamn murder him.

Well, Henry didn't do that. He kissed back. And he was actually...pretty...good at that. 

Joshua pulled away, and his mentor traced his jawline, causing the apprentice to shiver. His mouth turned up in a sly smile, his tone sweet as honey. "A closeted little faggot, hm? I thought you would be." 

It took a second for the cloying tone to evaporate in Foley's mind and the meaning of the words to hit. He scowled and shoved Henry away, immediately feeling thoroughly humiliated, and stalked in the opposite directions to do the fucking tracker implants. 

"If it's any consolation, I won't tell anyone!" McCoy smirked behind him. 

"Fuck off!" Josh snapped.

\------------ 

_Well, that was nicely dealt with,_ Henry thought, pleased with himself. Distracting his apprentice from an irritating assumption about his patient, and revealing his personal sexual decisions...two birds with one stone, and he was that much closer to working out exactly _who_ Joshua Foley was. 

Henry whistled a pleasant tune as he walked. He paused it when he arrived at Clarice's cell, eyes darkening when he saw her lying perfectly still in fetal, her eyes open and unblinking. 

Oh, but that was a pleasant surprise. 

McCoy picked up his little diddy as he entered, closed the auto-locking door, clicked a pen and jotted down on his clipboard all information he could surmise from her immobility. When he was finished, he held the board in one hand and clasped his wrist with the other, leaning back against the door and observing the young woman a moment.

She didn't move, besides the shifting tension in her muscles. She was obviously aware of her surroundings to be tensing in his presence.

This was getting dull.

Henry set the clipboard down and tucked the pen behind his ear. "Well. I'm disappointed in you, _Clarice_ ," he sighed, leaning over the gurney and holding onto the tops of her feet. She jerked them away just a little bit. Good. Still responsive to touch. "I didn't think anything could break that strong little spirit of yours."

Not even a twitch from her.

His viper tongue was just starting.

"I guess you're just _weak._ You can only survive if you've got a comfy med table and a nice, friendly doctor doting on you day after day," Henry went on talking, filling space. "Of all the reasons to give up and sputter out, Clarice, I didn't think yours would be some idiot's _dick._ "

That got her attention. Those specifically stressed words, that final statement, prodding at her weakness and inability. Henry felt a great deal of satisfaction when she raised her head to look at him.

"Shut up." 

"Oh, hello. I guess you can still talk," he smirked, leaning down over the foot of the gurney and tilting his head like one might to a pet. "How was your stay at Seattle, hm? Did you have _fun_ being dear old Sugar daddy's little fuck-puppet?"

The girl sat up and launched herself at the doctor, punching Henry square across with a scream. _"Ya fuckin' bastard!"_

Not that the movement or words had any effect on Henry. His head didn't even turn. He did scowl in annoyance as he caught the girl's struggling, flailing arms and twisted them behind her back. He forced her back down, cheek pressed against the metal platform.

"That's much, _much_ better," he crooned, holding her still even while she fought. "I thought you might've decided to atrophy. Just shrivel away into nothing. Then you would've been a _real_ disappointment."

"An' it would'a been you're fault an' you would'a been mad at yerself fer days," she spat back, struggling less.

"Oh, yes, I'd be _sooo_ heartbroken," he drawled, rolling his eyes. His expression became icy as he turned her around and began to strap her to the table. His lips drew into a tight line.

Clarice quickly swallowed and stilled. Only once had Henry threatened her in a manner that had completely rocked the girl for days. He had strangled her until she blacked out, expression this dead and still when she woke up. Just the look in his eyes, therefore, commanded her attention completely the very few times he used it.

"Now," he began, his articulation was precise, quiet, calm, and deadly. "I am going to perform a routine checkup on you. If you breathe a single word, I will let a pair of guards into this room to sodomize you into submission. You've already been spoiled - I'll have no issues with it now. You will lie still, and you will answer my questions in as few uneducated words as you can manage. Is that clear?"

She was staring wide-eyed and terrified at him now, breaths coming shallow, and nodded to acknowledge his commands.

"Good."

And so the checkup proceeded. Henry drew a slow series of blood samples, took other fluid samples, used Apocalypse tech to map her body, tested her reflexes and her body's new responses to certain touches (tainted from their original by her recent trauma), and then asked her questions.

"How did he use you?"

Clarice naturally found it difficult to answer. Anyone would. But at least, Henry supposed, she didn't burst out crying. Blabber was useless.

"Mostly his dick an' tongue," she winced eventually. She'd learned the swears long ago from Henry himself, crude as he was. "First day he put...he put 'is fingers in my ass."

"Mm. Were his fingers wet?" 

"No."

"How many?"

"Dunno. Two?"

"How frequently did he use you?"

"First day, then I fell asleep for two. Then it was ev'ry day fer five more. Then I fell asleep again, but I think 'e used me ev'ryday after that."

"How many times a day?"

"Us'ally twice at night. Dunno how many when I was asleep."

"I don't care about your mouth - he couldn't have injured you there. Between your anus and vagina, which did he use more often?"

She flushed pink on purple, glancing away. "Anus."

"Usually dry?"

She nodded. "Ne'er made it wet first, 'cept when he put his tongue in it. I had ta do that."

Henry growled as he inspected a slide of fresh blood for infection, disease, virus. "Fucking moron. He's never getting his filthy, snot-encrusted bony fingers on my long-terms again, ignorant freak," he muttered, pen making deep, angry welts as he jotted down 'H1N1 strain present matches Euro epidemic.' The Core was teeming with that virus, it was no surprise that she contracted it in her weakened and wounded state.

"Did you feel ill at all? Nausea, headache, stuffy nose, coughing?"

Clarice nodded again. "Sick all the time like throwing up, an' my nose was runny, an' I feel slimy still on my skin, an' my head still hurts. It's real tender at th' back. Sometimes I can't see, either."

He raised a brow and turned to her, examining the back of her skull just by touch. He felt a bloody patch, and pulled back, frowning at her. "Did he hit you at all?"

She frowned back, disbelieving. "All th' time. Picked me up by my hair an' slapped me an' threw me 'round the room an' slammed me 'gainst th' wall. An' that's how I fell 'sleep. Twice, he slammed me 'gainst th' wall."

Henry examined her eyes. Green, now, and smaller, instead of black and big. A blacklight still revealed what he needed to see - her pupils were the same size. When he shined a normal light into her eyes, there was a mild haze.

"I think you'll be fine. It's only a concussion, the problems should be gone in the next couple of weeks," he shrugged. "Of course if they're not, I get a whole goodie bag of fun things to do. For now, I have a plethora of other patients who are just _dying_ to see me."

Henry readied a syringe of anesthesia, cleaned the inside of an elbow, and dosed the inhibitor-collared teleporter, talking while she was still conscious.

"I would rather this hadn't happened, you understand. I had no desire to feed you to that _dog_. Rape is completely unnecessary and unscientific, without purpose, a means to nothing. If everything had simply _gone my way_ , Sugar Man would never have touched you, Clarice."

The fog began to overtake her, but the girl was shocked and relieved at his explanations.

 _He...He's tryin' ta 'pologize,_ she realized, as Henry went on about how he didn't really care but there was no reason to rape someone when you could just _coerce_ them and they'd enjoy it, and that would fuck them up more than fucking would. _McCoy, that fuckin' bastard, 's tryin' ta 'pologize ta me fer gettin' me raped. He ain't ever 'pologized ta anyone._

As she drifted away and the doc finally left her cell, Clarice felt completely confused and much less hurt.

And so, so very tired. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> UP NEXT
> 
> The focus shifts.
> 
> Will it be on... Joshua?  
> Chris Summers?  
> Some other poor wretch?
> 
> Find out next time on...
> 
> my fucked up world


	5. Poker Chips

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A nice, light chapter to break up the Dark and Dismal happenings. We have some happy times ahead before I move more focus onto a) Heaven, b) politics, and c) some of the not-Dark-Side characters in AoA.
> 
> Enjoy! And don't forget to breathe!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter warnings: blood; swearing; manipulation; mentions of Sinister
> 
> Enter: Scott Summers, aka. The Second-Nicest Guy in AoA

_"McCoy!"_

Josh was truly startled when the body whose approach he had sensed stalked into the room and yelled. It wasn't even so much the yell - lots of guards yelled, it wasn't strange - but the huge voice. His knife slipped and cut the spinal cord, causing the patient to scream in agony-

"Oh fuck," he muttered, setting down the knife, glad Henry wasn't here. He would've mocked him for sure. "Oh fuck, oh fuck, _oh fuck_ that hurts-"

The biokinetic kept his mouth tightly shut while the patient became paralyzed, quickly placing a hand over the bleeding wound and focusing on the area. Once the nerve was healed, the paralysis would disappear.

It did.

Thank the fucking lord.

"What the hell is your problem?" he snapped, figuring it was just a guard with a bigger voice. When he turned around and glared at the man...well...

That was an EMF patch. Aaaand that other one meant the guy was a Prelate.

"Uh...sorry?" Josh winced.

The man frowned. "No, that's my fault. Is the patient okay?"

Foley just about went into shock. It was the Prelate's fault? He was actually taking responsibility for Josh's slip up? "Ummm. Yes." he said. Why did the guy even care?

He could swear the man was hiding a smile. He thought for a second that he must have a really nice smile. "You don't sound too sure about that."

"He's fine," Josh spoke, looking the Prelate over. Long brown hair - weirdly sexy - scarring over an eye, visor covering both eyes, tall and buff. Huh. "I healed him, he's healed, he's fine."

Now _that_ definitely _is_ a smile. "Better. Good work, nurse." The man extended a hand. "What's your name?" 

"Thanks. It's Josh," he smiled, accepting the handshake gladly, the perfect excuse to feel around the man's biology. "Joshua Foley." 

"Nice to meet you, Josh," he smiled sincerely, firmly shaking and then letting go so much sooner than Joshua would've preferred. He could feel around inside a body all day. 

"You too," he smiled back. Strong body. Muscles were all freshly worked, protein digesting from the last meal, no illnesses, strong immune system, few poisons in the liver. So clean and strong. And full of healthy happy hormones, too. He seemed really nice. For the first time, Foley actually _liked_ someone in this place. "Hey, what's your name?" 

"Scott Summers," he supplied. 

"Cool. I'm talking to Scott Summers," Josh nodded. Neat. "You're in the paper sometimes. But they never put pictures of people if they're not Apocalypse, so." he explained. That's why it's so awesome that I'm talking to you. You're in the paper sometimes. But I couldn't recognize you. Sorry man. 

"Yessir. I'll sign autographs if you want," Scott laughed. "I don't suppose you know where Henry is, do you?" 

"Oh yeah," he nodded. "He always tells me where. Sometimes I'm sure he's just bullshitting, but yeah. He's with a patient. I don't remember her number, but her name's Clarice," Joshua shrugged. It was nice to talk to nice people. You could say more. 

"Oh, I see," the Prelate frowned. "The lost bet." 

Foley frowned back. "Lost bet...?" 

He seemed surprised. "The gossip hasn't circulated through the nurses yet?" 

"Well, I'm not really a nurse. I'm an assistant, sortof. An apprentice, except I'm pretty sure he's not keeping me for more than the trial run." 

"Right," Scott nodded slowly, looking at Josh funny. "Henry made a bet with Sugar Man - a...distasteful geneticist based in Seattle - two weeks ago and lost it. Clarice was his side of the bet. He won't tell us what the bet was, but he lost. It doesn't really matter." 

"Wow." Joshua paused. Pocket money. The girl got raped because she was used like pocket money. Poker chips. "That's kinda...wow." 

"Yes." Scott's response was equally serious. "You'll find a lot of that sort of thing goes on around here. Prisoners are items. They're used as such." 

He felt a little nauseous. 

"Henry doesn't accept apprentices," Scott changed the subject, evaluating Josh. "How did you get him to take you on?" 

"I didn't," Foley shrugged. "I came in, presented my application, and he said he'd try me, basically. End of." 

"Uh huh..." Summers drew out. Amusement seemed to tickle his side. "That's all? No bribing, blackmailing? You didn't present anything else?" 

"Nope." 

Scott did another evaluation. "Did you have sex with him? You can tell me, I won't tell anyone else." 

_Holy fucking crap!_ Josh stared at him, mouth open. "No! Fuck no! Fuck that guy. No! What the hell, man? I came in, I said I need a mentor, he said ugh, fine, I'll try you. That's all! End of story." 

"Okay, I believe you," Scott held up a hand, a shit-eating grin on his face. "Just wanted to make sure, that's all." 

The biokinetic shoved his hands into the pockets of his lab coat and muttered, "Good." 

"So why the second-best geneticist?" 

"Henry asked me that," Josh stated, frowning at the other man. 

It was Scott's turn to shrug now. "I don't think he's ever actually had someone apply for apprenticeship, and Sinister's better known. It's a big deal, big question." 

"Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Basically, Sinister's a cold jerk without any personality. Not a lot of people get into training under him. And everybody wants to train under him. I figured I have better chances going for McCoy." 

"I see," Scott said. He had this weird little smile like he knew something Josh didn't. "Sinister's not really cruel to students or anything. He's just hard on them and firm when he teaches because he wants their best, that's all." 

"Meh," Joshua shrugged. "I've heard some scary hazing stories involving him. Anyway, this works for me, with McCoy. He's a pain in the ass to get along with sometimes, but he's pretty reasonable. I wouldn't want to work for Sinister. He sounds like a hardass." 

Now Scott looked kinda insulted, which was kindof weird. "Well, Henry tends to settle for mediocrity where-" 

"I don't settle for mediocrity in anything, Scotty," Henry hummed, walking into the lab. "That is a direct quote of daddy's bullshit. Joshua, be a dear and fetch me a mug of coffee, hm?" 

Foley frowned at McCoy, but walked past him to get to the counter. Henry interrupted his movement with a hand on his shoulder. 

"Atta good boy," he smirked, that same flood of pheromones as earlier flooding Joshua's senses. 

His face heated and he glared back at his mentor's leer, shoving out from under his hand and going to fetch the coffee. 

"I heard from one of the nurses that you're keeping a telepathic infant," Scott frowned at McCoy after watching the interaction. "Do you have a good reason for that, doc?" 

Henry sighed. "Nosy nurses, as always. Who was iit? Was it the little redhead with the freckles and brown eyes? She's a bitch, you can tell just by looking at her-" 

"Henry, I don't have time to play games with you," Scott growled, stepping towards the man. Joshua scooted past him and handed Henry the cuppa joe, one cream, no sugar. He scooted out of the picture again and watched from a distance. 

"Oh, that's disappointing. I guess I won't offer that game of Scrabble, then..." 

The Prelate practically loomed over the geneticist. Henry stared impassively up and sipped his coffee, then smacked his lips. 

"It's a high-energy generating telepath. If it's kept unconscious, it can produce hundreds of generators to power dear old Apocalypse's thriving new hell. Problem?" 

God, did Scott look frustrated. Josh thought back to when he was younger, and his mom had touched a pinch of cayenne pepper to his tongue because he'd been saucy to her. Little Joshua had smiled saucier up at her and licked his lips, "Tastes _good_." The poor lady had been just about ready to shake his brains out. 

Scott seemed like he wanted to shake Henry's smug little brains out of his head. 

"Yes! It's against the law to allow telepaths to live, and you're finding loopholes. If I have to tell Sinister - and you can bet your sorry ass I will - he'll whip the ever-living daylights out of you," he threatened. 

Henry stared squarely back at him, sniffed, and took another sip of coffee. "So you'd rather be responsible for the death of an innocent infant than displease daddy, then?" 

That gave Summers pause. 

The doctor took the opportunity. "I don't mind infanticide, Scott, but I would rather its life come to _some_ value. If you really want me to end it now, I'll have to. You're my commanding officer, after all. I respect that." 

Bullshit, bullshit, and more bullshit, Josh thought, watching Scott's defenses come down further with every sentence. How could the guy not see that he was being maneuvered? 

"It's illegal, Henry. I don't like it any more than you do, but the child can't be left alive." 

"Then I'll neutralize it," McCoy suggested in ever-so-gentle a tone. "We'll keep him in a dampered cell so his telepathy can't reach any other people. The entire purpose of destroying telepaths is to keep them from altering our states of mind. If he has no access to minds to alter them, he might as well not be telepathic." 

Summers worried at the inside of his cheek. Josh could feel the teeth almost cut into the walling of his mouth. "If you get into shit for this, I won't be held responsible." 

"I fully understand that," Henry smiled amiably, inhaling the smell of his coffee. "I'll accept full responsibility and deny you ever knew." 

"Good," Scott nodded, leaving the room. "Any more screw-ups in the next two days, Henry, I won't be able to overlook them." 

"Duly noted." 

Then Summers was gone. 

McCoy turned his smile, now self-satisfied and smug, back to Josh. "So... Who's the lucky boy?" 

Foley blinked at him, still amazed at how easily he'd managed to get Scott to overlook a huge breach of legality. "Huh?" 

Henry rolled his eyes and took another sip of coffee. "You _do_ have a boyfriend, don't you?" 

"Oh," Josh felt himself heating up again. He was stuck between being embarrassed and being confident. Go for the latter. Yeah. He smirked. "I do. He's sexy as hell and privileged." 

"Oh? How so?" McCoy inquired, continuing to sip away at the drink. 

Foley could tell right away he was going to like showing off his lover. "He's in his last year of university, studying architecture. Right now he's working on a huge class project. He inherited loads of money from his parents when they passed, and it's converted into a fortune in credits. Telekinetic." 

"Hm. Sounds like quite the catch," Henry smiled. "How did the two of you meet?" 

He snorted. "University. Control training. He blew something up and it hurt him, I healed him, he bossed me around for weeks for god knows why, I sassed him back, one thing led to another and...here we are." 

"How romantic," he drolled. "There's blood on your patient, and yet no wound. How in the hell did you fuck up a basic procedure?" 

Josh sighed, frowning. Here came the mocking. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What a relief this was to write. Seriously. After all that crap. *happy sigh*
> 
> No, Josh is not yet aware that Sinny=Summers' adopted dad.
> 
> He hasn't met Sinny or either Summers up til now.
> 
> Hmm, eh. _Hmmmmmm._ I wonder whose fault that is.


	6. Breakage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay. So uh. It was supposed to be happy.
> 
> Except I'm no good at writing happiness.
> 
> So here's some really awful cruelty that would be OOC if this wasn't AoA.  
> Please keep in mind the circumstances of this AU, the disclaimer, and heed the warnings.
> 
> And if you're good with all that? Enjoy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Warnings: homophobia; hidden homosexual relationship; psychological torture; victim blaming; non-explicit gore; mentions of rape; threats of rape; mentions and threats of pedophilia; general cruelty; general obscenity; mild swearing; teacher/student relationship; implied non-con; cheating. 
> 
> Of Importance: the characters mentioned by their last name in the first part are not references to Marvel characters. The guy who flies to the mounts and comes back bearing wool is a reference to a Marvel character. The prisoner numbers in the final part are also not references to Marvel characters.
> 
> Besides this. Prepared to be disappointed if you expected the bio- and tele- kinetics to have wonderful lives.
> 
> Henry does. Oh yes. He loves his life.

"A bit more to the right-" one student called. "Right there! Perfect. Hold that one, Keller!"

"Lewis, you're up!" Julian yelled, his focus on the precision-placed metal support unbroken.

"On it!" 

While Lewis tacked the metal together by superheating the place where the column and previous floor's column joined, it took all of Julian's focus, thought, stamina...everything, to keep the support column in place, not moving by even a millimeter. He broke out in a sweat.

"That's six minutes on your part, Keller," the first voice said. "Keep this shit up and we might just have to combine Benson and Gallman instead, send you home!"

Julian grit his teeth, keeping his focus on the column instead of the leading student's voice.

It paid off to ignore the leader's condescension. It usually did. When Lewis had the column welded in place, the telekinetic released his hold, the strain fading gradually, the headache tearing his brain apart beginning to once more recede.

One more hour. That's all he needed to do. One more. He rubbed his hands, particularly the knuckles and wrists, as he awaited the next task. That column was the last for this floor - the strength muties and the weaker telekinetics would take over the rest of the outer walls. Meanwhile, Julian's thoughts quickly took a dark turn.

Six fucking minutes he was down to. The leader, Young, seemed to think it wasn't a huge accomplishment to fine-place a massive object in six minutes. Hell, two months ago Julian had been taking upwards of twenty-five minutes. He'd trimmed it into a quarter of that original time. 

Six fucking minutes.

Why Young was even leading the team was beyond him. Sure, a physical mutation with x-ray vision was impressive, but not powerful. Not necessary. Not useful. Young was even a shitty leader - he got people to do things by bullying them into it. Hey, Julian, your timing sucks. Put in an extra four hours of fine-training this week or we'll have to haze again.

Ugh.

He hated hazing. He hated the whole concept, hated that it happened so often, hated that sickly, beautifully seductive joy in hurting someone else that crept into his chest and buried itself there. Nobody learned anything from it, except that being a loser sucks and hurting other people is acceptable, and great.

One of these days he was going to challenge Young, and win, and then he'd be the leader and that guy would get all the hazing he could take. Maybe they'd even end up killing him. It wasn't exactly against the law. 'Survival of the fittest' and all.

"Julian!"

God, how his heart felt like he was inhaling fresh - rather than heavily polluted - air when he heard that voice. Keller turned around and smiled as O'Neil dropped Foley off.

O'Neil specialized in levitation, that's all. This elevator job he was doing right now? That was as high as he'd ever get on the totem pole of Apocalypse's class system.

That didn't matter right now. Castes and bullying leaders and fucking jackass competition telekinetics...none of it mattered.

Just the tired smile on Josh's face when the healer came up and clasped Julian's shoulder. "Hello, Foley," Julian smirked. "Miss me?"

The other young man rolled his eyes. "Miss you? Of course not. No, the only reason I wanna kiss you and take you home to fuck all night is because you're hot and I objectify you," he prattled on, then took a break. "I miss you _so much_ , Jules," he whined.

"Fucking sounds so good right now." Julian felt a pleasurable warmth radiating from his shoulder throughout his muscles, and he pushed Josh's hand off with a frown. "What did I tell you about that? No healing. None. You need your strength."

"Geez, Julian," Joshua frowned right back, then snuck a hand to run through Keller's hair. It came away with at least twenty hairs. The telekinetic winced. "You are _going bald_ from how hard _you're_ working. When I'm _going bald_ from my work, you can tell me I'm not strong enough to heal you. Until then, you're keeping your goddamned hair, you moron."

He had a point, really, but Julian was not about to admit that. He rolled his eyes instead. "There is absolutely no way I can get you to stop worrying about me, is there?"

"Nope," Josh stated decidedly, hands back on Keller's shoulders. The two were quiet for a moment as he targeted tense muscles, stiff joints, and hair follicles. Julian was in heaven as the healer's powers worked him over, restoring much of the energy he didn't have left.

"I brought your supper, too," Josh said quietly, tongue running over pitch-black lips as he watched Julian's blissed-out whorish- _Oh hell no I am not using that bastard's words, fuck this shit_ -

"Mm. Thank you," Julian smirked, moving the box from Josh's hands onto a workbench (with tk, of course). He touched Foley's cheek, running his thumb over chin and then lips, a very playful and flirty grin gracing his own. "You'd better get those magic hands off me, Mr Foley, or I won't be able to help myself before we get back home~"

Josh grinned back wickedly, the tip of his tongue meeting the finger on his lips. "I don't want you to help yourself...that's my job, Mr Keller."

The telekinetic literally threw his head back and laughed. He pulled away from Joshua and sat down at the workbench. "That was a lame comeback, Josh."

"Your reaction tells me otherwise," Joshua winked, sitting down beside Julian but keeping a modest distance between the two of them. No one would've seen their interaction, with Julian turned to impede a view with his back, but they didn't want to be seen right against one another.

Julian hated having to hide.

He also hated the habit Josh had of not eating at the end of the week. The rations ran low, he got that, but Julian didn't need much to eat either. Equal splitting would be fine. But no, Foley had to completely stop and excuse himself with his mutation and give the rest of the food to Keller.

"Did you eat?" he asked as he opened the box, knowing Josh probably hadn't.

"Yep," the biokinetic said with a nod.

"Did you eat much?" Julian asked.

"Yeah," Josh shrugged, glancing away for barely a second. "I had an apple."

Keller frowned. The supper Josh had packed for him was a protein-paste sandwich with lettuce. He tore off part of it and handed it to Joshua. "No option. Eat it."

"I'm not hungry," he scowled.

"I don't care. You need food. If you don't eat, we don't fuck," Julian stated.

Josh pouted. "What about all that upset when someone threatens people into obeying?" he raised a brow.

Julian raised one right back. "I'm not threatening you. I'm stating the consequences. You eat, we fuck. You don't, we don't fuck. You won't have the energy."

"Excuse me! I'm not _weak_. I'll have plenty of energy," Josh said.

"Eat your paste..." Julian frowned heavily and leaned into Josh's space, eyes glowing slightly. "...like a good boy, Josh."

And even if this had been ruined for Josh just a little by his mentor, unknown to Julian, those few words still made him flush and squirm.

"...yes, daddy..." he just about whispered.

Julian smiled and pat Foley's thigh. "We're going to have _lots_ of fun tonight, baby."

\------------

**The Next Morning**

Josh kept his scarf on when he hung up his sweater, hoping to god Henry didn't notice as the apprentice went to get the coffeepot.

"You're late, Mr Foley," the dreadfully calm, dreadfully placid voice said.

No luck. Ugh.

"Yeah, sorry about that," Josh shrugged, bringing over the pot. He filled Henry's mug - this morning it was the one that had a cartoon boy making a bunch of fucked-up snowmen. Henry was happy this morning. He could tell from the mug choice. "Just some mechanical problems."

"Oh, I'm sure," McCoy smirked pleasantly, sipping the coffee and eying the scarf Josh wore. The biokinetic walked away to put the pot back. "Did you make that yourself?"

"Yeah," he nodded, fingering the edge a bit. This one had been crochet. Took a lot of sourcing for the wool, but he got it eventually out of the mountains through this guy who flew back and forth from Apocalypse City to Holocaust's Realm on message duty.

"Mm. It's nice work," Henry smiled, a brow arched. "It's also a very obvious cover. Take it off, let's see," he said, standing up and approaching.

Josh froze a moment and swallowed tightly. "It's none of your business. They'll be gone in an hour or so, anyways, it's no big deal."

"If you say so," McCoy smirked, a dark and dirty look in his eye that made Foley feel seriously awkward. He stayed quite close to the biokinetic for a moment, and then turned away with a whistle, fetching lab coats and clipboards.

Josh couldn't help thinking of these old documentaries he'd seen about sharks. They'd come very, very close to their prey, checking it out, sometimes even bumping into them, and then swim away.

And then of course they would come back in for the kill, all three smiling rows of razor-sharp teeth in bright red gums shielding a great, gaping throat-

Holy crap did that make his skin crawl.

He jumped when Henry tossed him a lab coat, and slipped it on with a flush. The clipboard was handed to him.

The name on the top of the list was Ferguson, Clarice.

_Ugh._

"Oh, come on!" Josh groaned, looking up at the sha- At McCoy. "Why can't you just visit her yourself? What do you want me there for?"

"Oh, suck it up, Joshua," Henry rolled his eyes, somewhat snappish. "It's not as though she bites anyone. Well, she would if she could, but that's why I keep her strapped down. The point: she's a little girl. You have nothing to be so _terrified_ of."

"I'm not scared of her, I just don't like talking to her," Josh grumbled. "What do you want me to do?"

"Simple. You're going to run through the normal checkup routine, feel around her injuries but not heal them, and wait for her to ask why _I_ haven't come to visit her today," Henry explained. "At which point you will tell her that I don't see a _need_ to visit her anymore. She's been destroyed, she's no longer worth my time."

Josh frowned at the man. "Why the hell would you want me to tell her that?"

Henry sat back down to his coffee and crossword puzzle. "It will help her recover. Be cruel. She's only bent a little right now. You can do that to her, Foley. I have faith in you."

The biokinetic frowned at him for a moment. "Ummm...how is breaking her going to help her recover?"

He was awarded, predictably, with an 'I can't believe you're such an idiot' stare. "Because she can't cope right now. The poor bitch has no idea how much she's denying herself the luxury of actually _being injured_. She might _seem_ fine, Joshua, but _inside_ she's only a scared little girl, withering away because something that never should have been done was done to her. She can't admit it. So, rub it in her face until she can't help but realize that it was horrid and she's weak and damaged now. Once she admits that she can't be strong in that area, we can pretend to bolster her."

So...basically Henry wanted to coax her out of denial? And then..."So once she breaks, you want me to encourage her?"

"Exactly. Now you're catching on," McCoy smiled with satisfaction. "Yes. Break her, then explain that it wasn't her fault she was raped, that puppies and kittens fall out of the sky, whatever it is you need to say to get her emotionally and mentally healthy again. To get her to trust you, just a _tiny_ bit."

"Okay..." Josh nodded. It looked like they were helping her? When he explained it that way? Sortof? "Why do I have to do it? Why can't you do it?"

"Because you want to be my apprentice. Breaking and recovering patients is just part of the job you've studied and applied for," Henry explained. "The best way to train you is to let you loose and see what you can do on your own in that department. And do understand that this one is very important to me. If you don't fill my requirements and she ends up more damaged or too hardened, your head will be on the line."

"Yeah, yeah," Josh rolled his eyes. "I still have that list of questions I want to ask you, y'know?"

"We'll get to that," McCoy waved dismissively. "Come up with a good excuse for the scarf. Clarice is smarter than you know, and if it seems odd, she'll find a way to wheedle in and manipulate you into some corner or other. She's watched me play for years, she's learned more than you have. It almost comes second-nature to her."

Josh gave him a weirded-out look. "She's going to manipulate me because I'm wearing a scarf?" 

Henry simply looked at him, silent.

"She's been raped and had head trauma and you're telling me she can manipulate me because I'm wearing a scarf?"

"Yes." the doctor waited for a response, but then sighed when Josh gave none. "She'll do anything to avoid cooperation - that's developed over the last couple years. You happen to be very volatile, Joshua, very sensitive to outside factors. Be aware."

"Okay, whatever," he said, more than a little irritated. He began to leave the room. Then he stopped, almost laughing. "We're trying to get a girl, here in _the breeding pens_ , to accept some therapy."

Henry stared square-on at him. "Essentially."

" _Why?_ You don't do this with other patients. Why does this one matter?" Josh frowned. 

"You'll find out," Henry smiled.

"Okay."

\------------

Josh paced the hall outside Clarice's cell for the longest time.

How the hell was he supposed to do this? And to _this_ girl. She'd been hurting for years, she'd just gone through the most devastating torture of her life. He didn't _want_ to hurt her more. He wanted to go back and hurl his clipboard at McCoy, shred this lab coat, and quit.

Except he couldn't quit.

He stopped, glaring at a wall, fists closed tightly. He couldn't quit. He had no choice. He needed this. He was failing in the class despite his mutation, despite his work, because of the stupid fucking jerk who sabotaged his test answers. Literally, took his tests off the pile and changed his selections, took chunks out of his essays. And he couldn't tell anybody, because then the teacher would have to fail him, even with half a year left. Not because of his grade - university was hardly about _grades_. He would get failed because he wasn't the fittest. Someone else got one over him. Someone else was higher on the food chain. Josh was basically dirt. They'd toss him out, and he'd have to scrap a living like a Scavenger.

His fist hit the metal wall with a resounding pound, creating no dent but shattering his knuckle, fracturing the bones in his hand up to his wrist. The pain got to him a couple minutes after the shock, and he repeatedly hit his head against the wall, gritting his teeth. He had to feel it for a while. It took his mind off wanting to cave the guy's face in.

His own healing factor had started to work on it, and Josh sped up the process when he could think clearly again.

He sighed when everything was back in the normal place.

How was he supposed to do this? Pretend he was just like the Doc? Ignore her until she spoke? He couldn't keep standing here. He was wasting time. He walked into the cell.

Clarice sat up tensely ( _Strapped down, my ass_ ), hugging her knees to her chest, covering herself. She seemed disappointed. Why? And for another thing, where was her clothing? She should've had it by now.

She seemed to get uncomfortable when Joshua stared, understandably. He turned the page of his clipboard over to view her chart. Nothing new since yesterday. Henry hadn't been in to check on her again. He smiled emotionlessly, clicking his pen.

"Good morning."

She didn't answer him, just looked with those newly green eyes.

"I'm going to do your regular checkup, Clarice. I'll need you to lie down."

"No ya won't," she narrowed her eyes at him. "Y'ain't doin' my checkup."

"I am, actually," he stated, expression hardening. "And you're going to cooperate."

"No, I _ain't_ ," she glared, muscles tensing. "Where's McCoy?"

"Busy," Josh snapped back. Then gave her a cool smile that didn't reach his eyes. He'd seen Henry with bull-headed patients. He never gave all the information at once. He gave just enough to keep them curious and questioning.

Clarice glared a moment. "Must be pretty big an' important."

Perfect. He pretended to be amused as he readied the syringes...once again, despite his discomfort, turning his back to the girl. "It's not, actually. It's hardly anything at all."

She was silent. "What is it?"

"Priorities, Claire," he smiled, turning to her with a hypo to draw blood. Henry was always running tests on the stuff.

"My name's Clarice," she hissed at him. The teleporter offered no resistance when Joshua swabbed her arm clean and took his sample. "What priorities?"

"His priorities. The doctor has thousands upon thousands of patients to tend, Claire," he said, blatantly ignoring her glare at the nickname. "It's a wonder he hasn't gotten bored of you in the last five years. But now, after-" He shrugged and rested the hypo in the neat little cooling case McCoy carried along between patients. "There are just too many other, _undamaged_ , interesting patients out there."

The girl wore an expression Josh had never seen on her before. Dead serious frown, clean slate eyes. He'd seen it in others that McCoy tended. She was freezing up, going on lockdown. The eyelid was closing so the speck of dirt would bounce off instead of going in.

It meant he was close to a tender place.

"After what?" Clarice said.

"Well, after you've been fucked and torn. You might even become one of those breeder sows. Can you imagine that? Birthing _his_ child?" Josh smirked harshly. Her skin grew pale. "Henry can't spend his time on birthers, Claire. You're only useful to him when he can still work on your mutation. If you're too depleted from feeding a little pest, he won't be able to. Hence, your drop in his priority list."

"I ain't got a baby," she said quietly, drawing her knees up again.

"Maybe not," he shrugged. "But Doctor McCoy has entrusted your welfare to _me_ , whether you end up birthing or not."

Clarice stiffened and watched him take out a few swabs. She opened her mouth when he came over. He pressed into her gum much harder than he needed to. She frowned when he pulled back away. 

Josh felt stuck, now. There was no crying. He swabbed her underarms for toxins in perspiration, ears for toxins in wax, to see what had gone in that was coming out. Then, with a shudder, he got it.

"Turn over, Clarice."

She frowned, but obeyed, lying down on her stomach. She watched him over her shoulder, eyes narrowed.

"Now, stay still," he instructed, touching one of her thighs. She flinched and tensed, but lay still. He targeted her reproductive organs, set her vagina lubricating itself. He felt her flush, felt her breathing quicken, watched her push her forehead against the table. "Good girl. Stay still, just like that," he said, watching her carefully. He placed his other hand on her opposite thigh and moved them slowly up her legs. As he was going he felt knots in the muscles, healed and relaxed them, and kept her aroused. Eventually he was on her rump, no struggling from her even once. 

This felt awful to do to her. At least he could enjoy the touching part.

He pushed her cheeks apart with one hand to expose her ass. Clarice bit into her arm, suddenly terrified. He dulled the effect of the adrenaline so she wouldn't go into the flight mechanism. He reached for a swab - dry, yes, but they were small.

She bit her arm again, tears starting to run from her eyes.

"Do I have to put you in a mouthguard?" he asked ever so sweetly, pushing the swab in while she let go of the bite and squirmed at the intrusion. She was crying now, but not making a sound, and Josh realized that's what the bite had been. Preventing sound.

He pulled it out rather quickly, and Clarice relaxed against the table, tears still running down her face. Josh felt sick. He kept going.

"Huh. Would you look at that?"

She didn't look at him. She was hiding her tears like she hid her noises. That was strength. He needed her weak. 

_"Look._ At me, Clarice," he said slowly.

She bit her lip and put on a scowl, but looked over her shoulder.

He pushed two fingers and a swab into her well-wettened hole. He felt the spark of pleasure sweep through all the nerve endings behind the skin, watched her scowl break into mild panic. He pulled them out and set aside the swab, but held up the two black - and now shiny - digits, wiggling them. "You're wet. Do you know what that means?" he asked in a condescending talking-to-a-toddler tone.

She just stared at him, eyes moist, trying not to cry.

He smiled. "It means you enjoyed what I just did to you." Lie. "Your body gives you away. You pretend not to enjoy it, but your body does. You try not to cry, but it betrays you with those tears."

"I didn't-"

"Shut up!" he yelled suddenly. She jumped right out of her skin, poor thing. "I want you to repeat after me, understand?"

She was crying. Really, honestly, earnestly crying now.

"I am weak."

"I am weak," she sobbed.

She didn't hesitate. She believed it. Henry was right. 

"That's right. Now, I enjoyed being raped."

Her sobbing got harder, louder. She shook her head.

Josh slapped her. "Say it. Just once. Tell me you enjoyed it, Clarice."

"No!" she yelled at him, got up and tried to hit at him through her continuing sobs. "No! You can' make me say it any more than he can! Go 'way! Get out!"

He grabbed her wrists, forcing her down onto the bed and then changing her nerves. Her arms and legs were paralyzed. "You are my patient, Claire," he growled at her. "You're going to obey me just as nicely as you obeyed Henry when he still gave a fuck about you. Because if you don't?"

She stared at him during his long pause, her eyes drowning in fear, pain, hatred and despair.

"I will make the rest of your life more of a _hell_ than McCoy or Sugar Man _ever_ did. Okay?"

Clarice clenched her jaw, not looking at him, trying to keep her face from contorting in another series of cries. "I liked it," she muttered.

Joshua allowed her control of her legs, but not her arms. "What was that? What did you like? I couldn't hear you."

She glared. "I liked the rape."

He smiled, releasing her arms to her again. "Yes, you did," he said, turning to fetch an instrument that would tell him how old her brain injuries were and what damage the concussion and trauma had done. When he turned, she was on her knees on the bed, poised to leap.

For a second, he was actually scared. But he smiled. Her powers were inhibited, so she had to touch him to hurt him. He could kill her easily, more quickly than she could end him. "Nice try. Lie down. You do that again, I'll strap you in."

She scowled and lay down. He told her to close her eyes for the scan. When she did, he strapped her libs to the table. When she glared at him, he simply smiled again.

She could design a million reasons for his smile. That's what Henry said. That's why he did it.

"It is true, partially," he shrugged, beginning the scan. "Bodies always tell the truth about what they like and don't like, and I can tell bodies - that's just my mutation, y'know? But bodies don't tell you what you like. They can't figure it out. Between that mystery stuff behind your eyes and the thing in your chest that's made of the same material...I guess there's just too much unknown? But anyways, your body doesn't know what you like, Claire. Just because it gets wet down there," he tapped her thigh, "doesn't mean you're wet up here," he tapped her forehead.

She frowned at him, seemingly thinking. He gave her a moment.

"Your _body_ liked it when I touched you. If it liked it while Sugar Man raped you, that's not because _you_ liked it when he did that. It's because your body liked it. Or it didn't, and I'm wasting my time explaining the difference to you," Foley shrugged. She didn't respond. "If you didn't like it in your head, and your body didn't like it, then there's no conflict. But if your body did like it and you didn't, there's conflict. And you win the conflict. Because bodies just can't control themselves sometimes, but _you_ can decide whether or not you like something."

"Y're lyin'," she said suddenly. Josh looked questioningly at her. "Y're lyin'. He sent you here t'say that stuff an' reassure me. Bein' nice."

For once, Joshua found himself on quick feet. "If I was here to reassure you, Claire, I wouldn't be telling you that you could be pregnant, or that you're worthless and weak and not worth a head geneticist's time. And I wouldn't be sticking my fingers into you. But, if that's reassuring, I'll be glad to do it again," he gave her his most perverted, laughing smile, teasing a pair of fingers between her legs. She closed her thighs as tightly as she could. "And if Henry hadn't handed you over to me completely, I wouldn't be considering _fucking you_ and further damaging his products. But you're mine to break now, as much as I like."

She watched him for another long moment, watched the scanner above her head.

"Yer a mean, nasty bastard, M' Foley."

He simply smiled down at her.

\------------

"Well?" Henry asked, crossing another dead body off the list of those to be converted to Infinites. One of the strong guards dumped said body into the pool of liquefied genetic matter. "How did it go?"

Josh felt like shit. He didn't feel panicked, didn't feel horribly guilty, didn't feel sorry for the girl he'd just psychotortured. He felt nothing. Not a thing. No remorse, no shame. If anything, he felt like he was full. Full like when you'd had enough chocolate cake, but you still wanted more, even when you couldn't fit anymore without gagging. Wanted the taste back in your mouth. Stated and starving all at once.

"It went fine," he said slowly, watching the body fall into the vat. Another was soon dragged forward.

"Number 4370," one of the guards said.

Henry crossed another body from his list.

"She believes you're never going to see her again. That she's worthless to you. That she could be pregnant and be discarded as a breeding bitch," Josh said.

"Number 6091."

Check.

"She's my project, now, according to what I told her and what she'll be led to believe if you don't visit her," he said, watching for a reaction. Henry crossed another body from the list as another guard dumped one. No reaction. "She's scared of me. Or at least thinks I'm really cruel. She admitted being weak."

Henry nodded. Another body.

"She didn't say anything about the scarf."

That got a laugh out of his mentor. McCoy actually looked up at him for the first time since Josh had entered the room. He smiled, evaluating the young man, and beckoned him over. "You, Nurse Foley," he said, a hand resting on Joshua's neck and those not-so-unfamiliar pheromones pushing out, "have just passed as an apprentice. If you don't fuck things up for yourself in the next three months, that is."

Josh's skin crawled. "Why? How did I pass?"

"Why, by showing your colors, Joshua." Henry led him by the neck out of the room, into the empty hallway, away from the guards. "You've got it in you to really mirror me. If you were so cruel that she couldn't see past her own dirt to use yours against you, then you'll be able to take position as my apprentice, Foley."

Henry's voice had reached a growl. That, and the hand on Joshua's neck, and the pure arousal off the man...he was _so_ goddamned turned on. He leaned in close to the older man, staring at his lips and feeling through his hands on Henry's arms the tensing muscles. Julian came to mind, but not long. Not when he could feel every cell in McCoy's body.

"You've cracked a perfectly solid mind like an egg. Yes, to your earlier implied question, by the way. You can keep her. For now," Henry told him, a hand resting on his hip.

Josh pressed his groin against McCoy's leg, canting forward when the other man smirked at him.

Henry pushed him off, breaking that physical touch that really nailed the arousal for josh. "You've got a boyfriend, Joshua," he said, waggling his finger. "And you shouldn't be fucking with your teachers, anyways. I'll take a blowjob anytime, but it won't help your grades."

"Fuck grades," he frowned, stepping back into Henry's space and touching him again. He dropped to his knees and roughly palmed the man's groin. "You've got one too, so who gives a shit?"

Henry inhaled in surprised pleasure, almost laughed when Josh mentioned a boyfriend, and then smirked down at the young man, hand caught well in the blond's hair.

"Well said, Joshua."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now. We're getting somewhere.
> 
> I'm going to be posting a liiittle less frequently for a bit - life just got totes busy.


End file.
